The Vice President has said the International Monetary Fund (IMF) programme under the NDC government was completely run off-track by the time the current government came into power. Dr Mahamudu Bawumia said, “We renegotiated the IMF program in a manner that provided us fiscal consolidation and at the same time fiscal space to deliver on our promises to Ghanaians.” Speaking at a Town Hall Meeting in Kumasi Tuesday, he said, “It took some skill and experience on the part of the Ghana team to renegotiate the IMF program that ensures consolidation but at the same time strong growth, and which Ghana successfully exited in April last year. “After three years in office, the results of the fiscal consolidation are evident and the data shows that significant progress has been made to restore macroeconomic stability and economic growth.” He said the growing confidence in the macroeconomy owes a lot to the prudent management of public finances and monetary affairs over the last three years. “To underpin fiscal discipline going forward, Ghana has for the first time in our history passed into law a Fiscal Responsibility Act that limits the fiscal deficit in any year to a maximum of 5% of GDP and requires a positive primary balance to ensure debt sustainability,” he added. According to Dr Bawumia, “for the first time in a decade, Ghana recorded primary balance surpluses for three years in a row. The primary balance surplus was 0.5% of GDP in 2017, 1.4% in 2018, and 0.9% in 2019 compared to a primary deficit of 1.1% of GDP in 2016.” Inflation On inflation, Dr Bawumia said, “A combination of prudent monetary policy and fiscal consolidation supported by zero central bank financing of government and strong external sector developments have underpinned a steady disinflation process over the past 36 months.” Inflation has dropped steadily from a high of 15.4 per cent at the end of 2016 to 7.9 per cent at the end of December 2019, about the lowest the country has seen since 1992.